Graduate student Emily McCullough made the digital slide presentation, Our Messy Solar System, before 45 visitors (30 children and 15 adults) from Lord Roberts Public School at the Cronyn Observatory for Exploring the Stars, Thursday, April 19th, 7:00 p.m. The adults included parents and 2 teachers and the children included grades 5 and 6 and 5 pre-school age children.
Since it was raining for the first hour-and-a-half, Emily did a solar system activity (acting out the planets, moons, dwarf planets, etc.) and a drawing activity. Everybody had a chance to look at the communications tower in south London through the big 25.4cm refractor. As people were leaving around 9:00 p.m., a patch of clear sky revealed Mars and 4 adults and 4 children viewed the planet through the big 25.4cm refractor, using the 32mm Erfle eyepiece (137X). Everybody enjoyed the event and expressed an interest in coming back next year.